


A tun of man

by Lilliburlero



Category: Henry IV Part 1 - Shakespeare, Henry IV Part 2 - Shakespeare
Genre: Gen, Homophobic Language, Misogyny, POV Second Person, Post-Canon, Sexism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 17:21:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6385459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilliburlero/pseuds/Lilliburlero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So, yeah, like, this bloke walks into a pub and meets Sir John Falstaff...</p><p>*</p><p>Note: homophobic language, misogyny, egregious second-person viewpoint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A tun of man

**Author's Note:**

  * For [disenchanted](https://archiveofourown.org/users/disenchanted/gifts).



> To disenchanted's prompt: 'Halstaff: things you said that I wish you hadn't.'

Maybe it’s been a shitty day. Maybe it began last night, when your mate got back to your digs after a night involving dubious shellfish. When the puking started you knew you weren’t going to get a wink, so you went and held his head over the bowl. Less to clear up in the morning. There’s still plenty to clear up in the morning. You cut yourself shaving and get blood on your only clean shirt, on the only place the jacket doesn’t cover. You drop by your mate’s work and tell them he’d eaten something that disagreed, to visible incredulity. When you get to your shop the boss is there waiting for you with another screed about punctuality. Your morning fills up with the sort of customer who wants to see someone in charge. Your only consolation is they don’t believe the gaffer either, when he says that wood (or iron, or paper, or pork) just doesn’t _work_ that way, and especially not at short notice. Dammit, they don’t believe his _wife_. Apparently it’s all still your fault, though, so you find your afternoon fills up with backroom tedium. The boss’s daughter comes in with a pile of account books, pinches your bum and runs away shrieking. It must be great to be seventeen and a genius at arithmetic. Eventually the clock strikes six. It’s been raining while you’ve been incarcerated in the stockroom. The streets are slick and soupy. You step on something namelessly revolting, skid. You manage to keep your feet but for all the good it’s done you, look, you’ve mud spattered nearly up to your arse. You need a drink. You pass your local. No fear. People know you in there, and you look like shite. You carry on up the road and turn into that big anonymous place on the corner. You’ve never been in before. It’s slightly dodgy. You can pick up a tart in the bar and take her upstairs, apparently. You haven’t got the money for a tart. (You suspect you’ve barely money for a pint, at hotel prices.) Not that you would anyway. It’s a bit too soon after she broke it off. The other blokes say you should just get back out there, or in there ha ha ha, otherwise you’ll lose your nerve. Maybe they’re right.

It’s grubby and fuggy, stinking of booze, sweat and damp coats. You can’t see anyone who looks like she’s on the game, just a gaggle of old girls around a backgammon board, some tubby, red-faced fellas trying to outdo each other with off-colour anecdotes, a few saddoes drinking alone. Like you. But it’ll do: there’s nobody you know here, and that’s the main thing. You order a pint; though the place isn’t even half full, there’s only one free table, awkwardly situated near the passage to the bogs. You sit at it anyway. Jesus, there’s nothing like a beer. You feel better already. 

He’s twenty stone if he’s a pound, and wearing just about the loudest suit you’ve ever seen in your life, but you don’t even see him coming. Fat men are often light on their feet like that, it’s weird. He just materialises out of the curtain hung over the entrance to the passage, which, fair enough, is nearly gaudy enough for him to blend into. He must have asked if it was all right to join you, otherwise you’d have felt some sort of indignation, wouldn’t you, but you don’t remember actually saying yes. Anyway, it’s done now. He’s talking, in the sort of pleasantly seasoned voice that's easy to listen to but equally easy to ignore while your thoughts wander. Posh, but with a touch of the West Country in its pronounced rs and twangy vowels. He all too clearly likes the sound of it too much to require anything from you but a periodic noise of agreement. So what if you have got yourself cornered by the pub bore? It’s not like you had anything better to do tonight. 

‘—can you wonder that the poor boy was seeking some distraction, some sort of escape? After that _dreadful_ business with his father and Richard? And getting himself conveniently out of the way of that unbelievable, grotesque show that the old man was planning in Oxford, thank God it didn’t come off. I don’t deny, he always had a gift for strategy, it’ll see him right now. But the first time I saw him in here, he just looked so—lost. All his armour on, of course—not _literally_ —but all that prickly, nervous defiance of his: pretending he knew exactly what he was doing, incognito as transparent as one of Doll’s negligées. And so absurdly young. Well, you would've had to have a heart of pure alabaster not to take him under your wing. I’m sure you’ve felt the same, you look like the caring type.’ 

You shoot him a wary glance, but his flat, dead-mullet drunkard’s eyes are inscrutable. He flexes a pudgy hand and drums his fingers on the table. His nails are filthy but pared and otherwise well-kept: not jagged and white-ridged like your own clean ones. You have absolutely no bloody idea who these people he’s talking about are, but it’s far too late to ask now without seeming like a complete pillock; he clearly expects you to know. You grunt in what you hope is a non-committal but polite fashion. 

‘I knew the dangers, you see, from personal experience. You wouldn’t think it to look at me know, of course, but I flatter myself I was at least tolerable-looking as a young man, certainly _other people_ thought so—there’s a fairly celebrated tempera panel of St George that got mentioned a lot, I don’t know if you know it, quite shy-making, really—and I was rather run after. Turned my head, spoiled me just a smidgen, and my vanity led me into a few tight corners. But who am I, after all? Nobody, my dear, nobody. _He_ was different. Imagine if some grasping hard-faced little bitch of a tradesman’s wife got her crooks in him: you know the sort, you can tell by the rear—’ 

You must look puzzled, because he tosses straggly grey curls in illustration. Old geezers like him should cut it all off, a ponytail’s pretty embarrassing when you’ve nothing on top. But then he’d look even more like a root vegetable. 

‘—the crimp, you know, the I’m-not-standing-for-this-get-me-a-manager hairdo—’ 

Well, you _do_ know that one, a bit too well after today. You both laugh. He has a nice laugh, not the creepy chuckle you’d been expecting, but a warm, encouraging sound that makes everyone’s jokes, including his own, seem funnier than they really are. You flag down a scampering waiter and order another pint for yourself, and whatever it is he’s having: something sticky and effeminate in small measures. You catch the tail-end of the waiter’s _your funeral, mate_ look. God, you think, people can be so _prejudiced_. He’s only a lonely, tragic old poofter, honestly, what harm in giving him the time of day? 

‘—and put the screws on: _sweetheart, I’m afraid I’m starting our baby; whatever shall I do, my husband’s on his third tour in Ireland and he simply mustn’t find out—_ and all that. It was a public service I was doing, really, my small contribution to the gaiety of nations, you might say. Not that it was a hardship. Lovely company, he was. Most of the time. He had a nasty streak, but most of the attractive ones do, don’t they?’ 

You clear your throat and say awkwardly, ‘I wouldn’t know much about that, really.’ It comes out all wrong and strangled, and he gives you an indulgent smile. You find you mind less than you thought you might, if it was put to you in the abstract. 

‘Not that he was, exactly. Not conventionally, even before the—’ he drags a finger along his cheek from the side of his nose almost to his ear, ‘you might’ve thought that would make him look a bit more rugged, you know, but it didn’t really, just caved his face in. Ruined. Lost quite a few teeth on that side, you see, smashed up his jawbone. Poor boy, he did feel it. Made him quite shy, and he hadn’t exactly been confident to start with—you’re surprised, aren’t you, and you wouldn’t be the first, but it’s true. You know what women are. Cruellest of the carnivora. Give me the bloody Frogs any day. Well, that’s what he’s gone off and done, I suppose. Sublimation, I could never master it myself. I’m the warm-blooded type. Anyway, I’d say to him, if it all goes wrong with any of them, you’ll always have a place here with your old Jack.’ 

He taps what he must imagine to be the location of his heart. Or maybe his liver. 

‘But—where was I? Yes, you wouldn’t think it, but he actually had quite a lot of hang-ups that way. Very religious, you see—of course, _now_ people say it’s just what’s expected of him, but it was genuine, cent per cent. I blame the parents. It’s usually the mother, too, but I think with him it was his dad, to be fair. Mary was no nun: though God knows that old miser Woodstock tried hard enough to make her one. Anyway, it wasn’t just the ordinary blues, the sort anyone might feel, except women and cocks, or so they say. Terrible, terrible, _terrible_ guilt: the absolute screaming ab-dabs, you know. The morning after a heavy night, and let’s face it, if it’s got me in it, it’s going to be a heavy one like as not, God forgive me, it’s just the way I’m made, he’d start up, just running with sweat, shivering, babbling about being licked with tongues of hellfire. And woe betide you made the obvious jokes, because he’d turn on you then, in all seriousness, too. Couple of times he actually thought I was the devil, can you imagine? On my life. Old white-bearded Satan, he called me, and just flew at me. He may have been skinny, but young as he was and all, he was strong, ever so wiry, not an ounce of spare. It was all I could do to hold him down. None of the others ever volunteered for that particular detail, I can tell you, no, they were off, soon as they’d had theirs. No, it was always faithful old Jack who brought him round, talked him down, sat with him, held him—’ 

Poor bastard, you think. He’d obviously fallen like a hod of bricks for the boy, who wasn't really that way at all. And you can’t help it when you fall for someone, you should know. Pretty sleazy, all the same, though, and you don’t really want to hear any more of it. No wonder the lad had upped and joined the Army, or whatever. 

‘Especially that vicious little crim—well, you’ll hear people say I would say that, wouldn’t I, after that positive _debacle_ out by Rochester, but believe me, it goes back—Frankie! Same again, there’s a dear—’ 

Oh bloody hell, you hadn’t really meant to have another. 

‘—oh, didn’t she say? No, I paid it off _ages_ ago. Well, the other day. Yesterday. This morning. Just before she left. I expect that’s why she didn’t mention it, she was in such a tearing rush, and you were run ragged yourself with that terribly demanding party checking out. Ask anyone—ask Ursula, ask Bardolph, ask Pist—clean as a whistle, I am now, and all up to date—fabulous, lovely, knew you’d see sense, Frankie darling. Good health. Now, where had I got to—oh, yes, Poins. Well, let other pens dwell there, if you catch my drift. But he was trading, and by God was he, on nobody knowing him here in the smoke, you see. I had his number, though, coming from the same part of the world. I knew his mother, lovely lady, thank the Lord she didn’t live to see. But his _poor_ sister—she had a _very_ nice personality, and he oughtn’t to have exploited it like he did—even tried to set her up, that’s putting it nicely, with Himself, once. That’s one thing I never did, though there were plenty who accused me of it, I never lived off a woman. Nor man neither, _just_ in case you were wondering. Anyway, I warned him about little Ned Poins, naturally, and that was pretty much the end of _that_ affair. No, God knows what he would have done without old Jack. I’m not one to blow my own trumpet—couldn’t get around the obstacle of my modesty, if you get me, though _he_ could, sometimes—’ 

He pats his belly. This has pretty much stopped being entertaining, if it ever was. You take a big gulp of your pint. It wouldn’t even have been as bad if he’d leered, but there’s a sort of soft, faraway look in his eyes, a bit like some blokes get when they talk about their kids being born. It’s not decent, that’s what it’s not. 

‘—but there is no getting round one thing, and it’s a big thing. Ooh, don’t mock, you awful boy. There aren’t many gentlemen in England now who can lie a-bed of nights—and when their time comes, on their deathbeds, though please God he’ll spare me another year—’ 

He touches the gimcrack gilt crucifix at his neck. 

‘—and reflect that they taught the King of England—God save his Majesty and be with his enterprise, perhaps soon King of France too, as by the ancient right of his noble forefathers—’ 

He hiccups delicately. 

‘—that they taught the King of England—all he knows.’ 

Oh, fucking hell. You’ve gone and got yourself a right fucking prize looper here. You always were too kind, everyone says so. Probably harmless, but you don’t want to test the hypothesis. You look down into your drink: there's about half of it left. You check out the possible escape routes, a bit too obviously, probably. When you look back at him, a huge, globular tear is teetering in the corner of his right eye, about to cascade into the deep, dirty crevasses of his fat face. 

You’ve got to say something. Anything, you’ve got to say anything. Something. Anything. Something. You say, like the total plonker you are, ‘Do you, er, see much of him these days? H—henry, I mean.’ 

He squeezes the bridge of his nose, compressing the tear into a revolting splodge of rheum. He says, with the authentic dignity that belongs only to howling, incurable madness, the sort that has people thinking they’re Charlemagne or Cleopatra, ‘I wish you hadn’t asked me that, my dear. Oh, _I_ don’t have any regrets. I always think someone should write a song along those lines, don’t you? I think a lot of people could—identify with it. And he did what he had to. We don’t see each other any more. There were harsh words at the end. Words, on his part, that one feels—one feels—no, I’m proud of him. Taught him all he knows. It’s enough. I hope that one day, before I die, he might send—send—some token, but I know it’s vain hope. No, no. I don’t need praise, ducks, and I don’t want pity.’ 

He stands up, sways alarmingly, but stays upright. He hiccups again, as if in farewell, turns on the ball of his foot, back the way—you presume—he came, and he has the stately, gliding walk of a queen. You let out a long sigh and shake your head over the dregs of your pint. You don't know what to think, so you don't think. You can think later. You get up to go. Frankie buttonholes you in the doorway. 

‘Sorry, mate. You wouldn’t mind paying for that round, would you? I can’t hardly say no to Jack, the way he is today, but he ain't good for nothing much, and I’ll be the one gets it in the neck from the management for letting him have tick. Bloody Tartar, the new landlord is, go off at you for nothing. Don't know why Jack sticks around. He must be mental. Scene of the crime, I reckon, they say they always go back. He used to own this place. He's a toff of some kind, a Sir, the land belonged to his dad. But he sold a share, and another share, and then he borrowed money off of a lawyer, always fatal, he had to flog the whole shebang. Sad, really. But I suppose you know that. If he’s a friend of yours.’ 

You hand over the coins. ‘Yeah,’ you say, not sure what you mean by it, ‘I suppose he is my friend.’ You don't wait for the change, even though that clears you out until payday. 

Your way takes you back past the big windows of the public bar. You can’t help but look in, a lighted room always has that sort of magic on an autumn evening. Jack’s in there again, comfortably settled across another table from another glum-looking, silent, grey-faced bloke, talking away nineteen to the bloody dozen. 

As I said, maybe it’s been a shitty day. Maybe tomorrow will be a better one. Maybe it begins here and now.


End file.
